Double-homicide case closed after 9 years

Double-homicide case closed after 9 years

Patrick McNamara/The Explorer, Family members of Ubaldo Contreras and José Robles-Estrada, who were murdered by a co-worker in 2000, placed these memorials in Honey Bee Park. The killing remained an open case until September 2009 when Oro Valley received confirmation from Mexico that their murderer had been killed in a shootout.

Double-homicide case closed after 9 years

Patrick McNamara/The Explorer, Oro Valley police recently closed the books on a double-murder, which occurred at the then-under construction Honey Bee Park on June 20, 2000. The suspect in the case fled to Mexico shortly after the killings. He was killed in 2008, but Oro Valley did not get confirmation of his death from the Mexican government until September of this year.

Almost immediately following the killing, Parra-Coronado fled to
Mexico, where

he remained until May 2008. This spring, Mexican authorities
found him shot to death under unknown circumstances.

Oro Valley police officials received word of the killing shortly
afterward, but the double-homicide case remained open. Now, the
department has officially closed the case, after receiving from the
Mexican government official notification of Parra-Coronado's death
in September 2009.

"From a department perspective, to have an open case is
something you don't like to have," Oro Valley Police Chief Danny
Sharp said. "There's closure now for the victims' families and the
police department."

Today, a pair of metal memorial signs and silk flowers put up by
the victims' families marks the spot where the men perished.

The bad blood that led to Robles-Estrada's and
Contreras-Figueroa's death had its genesis in a workplace dispute.
All of the men had worked as masons. On the day of the killing,
Parra-Coronado and three other men were working on the
then-unfinished Honey Bee Canyon Park.

He and Contreras-Figueroa had clashed in the past, witnesses to
the killing and co-workers told police.

The men's employer told police that Parra-Coronado had grown
jealous of Contreras-Figueroa's success and skill as a mason. The
employer told police he had to separate the men into different work
crews to minimize the arguments.

But the verbal harangues turned violent one day when
Parra-Coronado and another man fought Contreras-Figueroa, beating
him badly, according to police interviews with witnesses.

Bent on retaliation, Contreras- Figueroa and another man later
chased Parra-Coronado and a co-worker into the desert near Honey
Bee Park, hurling rocks at the men as they fled.

The confrontations became so frequent and disruptive that
Contreras-Figueroa and other man were fired from their jobs. But
their termination did little to extinguish the burning rivalry.

On the morning of the murders, Contreras- Figueroa and
Robles-Estrada appear to have intended to pay a similar visit to
Parra-Coronado as he prepared for a day's work at Honey Bee Park.
Contreras-Figueroa sped his truck into the dirt parking lot and
skidded to a stop near Parra-Coronado and co-workers Alvaro Garcia,
Joel Jimenez and Rosendo Sanchez.

As Contreras-Figueroa leapt from the pickup, Robles-Estrada
joined him in the show of force. But the men were poorly equipped
for the showdown with their archenemy.

"Unfortunately, he came to a gunfight with a shovel," Wright
said, referring to the shovel found next to their bodies.

As Garcia, Jimenez and Rosendo fled to the desert,
Parra-Coronado pulled out a .22 caliber pistol and ran straight
toward Contreras-Figueroa and Robles-Estrada.

In later interviews with police, Jimenez said Parra-Coronado
began to fire, first at Robles-Estrada, then at
Contreras-Figueroa.

The other men then fled the scene, telling police they ran out
of fear. Police were sure Parra-Coronado committed the killings
alone, so the others were not charged with any crimes.

A fourth eyewitness also identified Parra-Coronado as the
killer. He told police he watched Parra-Coronado gun down the two
men in the parking lot while working on the roof of a nearby
home.

"This guy was a cold-blooded murderer, Sharp said. "It was
important that he be prosecuted, either here or in Mexico."

That's exactly what happened when the investigation went cold
and police realized their suspect had fled to another country.

Working with an attorney from the State Attorney General's
Office, the town was able to convince Mexican authorities to
prosecute Parra-Coronado for the murders.

Mexican authorities issued an arrest warrant, but were unwilling
to extradite Parra-Coronado to face trial and a possible death
sentence in Arizona.

"Part of the nuance of this was that the victims were Mexican
nationals," Sharp said.

Despite closing the case, Oro Valley has never pushed a murder
prosecution through the full criminal justice system. Past murders
in the town were deemed case-closed at the scene of the crime.

Earlier in 2000, the town suffered a double-murder suicide when
an Oro Valley man turned a firearm on himself after killing his
wife and grandson. The town had another murder-suicide in 1994.

Oro Valley may prosecute its first murder case later this month,
when Paul M. Beam is scheduled to go to trial in Pima County
Superior Court, accused of killing his live-in girlfriend Lisa M.
Berrie in August 2008.